Movie making is all about story telling, and in an effort to fully set up his Middle East action thriller, The Kingdom, director Peter Berg commissioned motion design boutique PIC to create a unique title sequence that would detail the history of the relationship between Saudi Arabia and the United States. The three-minute intro that PIC produced gives viewers a succinct and entertaining historical background, and it saved Berg from having to shoehorn a time-consuming backstory into his film. Needless to say, the innovative credits sequence (which you can see for yourself, below) has been generating tremendous buzz in Hollywood. EW.com talked to the folks behind the clip to learn how they did it.
THE IDEA
Berg contacted three potential production agencies to create the title sequence for his movie. He instructed that the intro needed to tell the eight-decade history of Saudi Arabia and its convoluted relationship with the United States... and that was about it. Berg explained he liked the documentary An Inconvenient Truth, but according to Pamela Green, a producer at PIC, the director presented few other guidelines.
HOW THEY LANDED THE GIG
According to Jarik Van Sluijs, PIC's creative director, the company believes it won out because of its idea to couple bold graphics with archival footage. Also, Green says, the juxtaposition of the plane hitting the twin towers and then the screen going black really sealed the deal for the boutique agency, which is known for its trailers, television spots, and opening titles (The Bourne Ultimatum).
GETTING IT RIGHT
Producing the three-minute clip took nine months, during which PIC spent dozens of hours fact checking and obtaining rights for the audio and video footage that appears in the piece. All 128 shots had to be approved — a process that was expensive and unusually time consuming. Green did everything from calling Dubai at 12:30 in the morning to convincing CNN to release their exclusive footage of Osama bin Laden walking with the gun over his shoulder. Through the course of her work, Green became friends with the brother of Saudi Arabian ambassador Adel al-Jubeir, which yielded an interview for her narrative. She also culled through hours of home movies from an American who grew up in Saudi Arabia, in order to dig up those images of people playing football and swimming in a pool.
REAPING THE REWARDS
Robert Redford was so impressed with what PIC did for The Kingdom that he hired the firm to create the beginning and ending credits for his November political drama, Lions for Lambs. Also, according to Green, Charlize Theron (who is set to star in Berg's next movie, the superhero drama Hancock) saw The Kingdom's opening and encouraged PIC to work on her boyfriend Stuart Townsend's upcoming film, Battle for Seattle. For that movie, the group is creating a title sequence that tells the history of the World Trade Organization. As Van Sluijs says, ''People come to us to tell a story.''
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